According to a recent analysis, nearly 10 million American adults will have consumed microdoses of psychedelic substances like psilocybin or LSD in the year 2025.
The results of the RAND Corporation survey indicate that microdosing—which involves ingesting a small amount of a drug to improve mood and well-being without experiencing hallucinations or a full-scale trip—is a popular practice in the U.S.
In a Wednesday press release, Michelle Priest, RAND researcher and lead author of this new study, stated that there is a growing discussion on the impact of microdosing, on mental health, creativity, wellbeing, and well-being. Our findings indicate that taking small doses of psychedelics can be a significant experience for people who take them.
More than half (69%) of those who consumed psilocybin during the previous year admitted to having microdosed. In the past year, 65 percent of MDMA users microdosed and 59% of LSD consumers did.
Overall, RAND estimated that approximately 3.7 percent of U.S. adults—or 9.55 million people—microdosed psilocybin, MDMA and/or LSD in 2025.
The RAND paper also looks at psychedelics use more broadly, beyond microdosing—finding that the five most commonly used psychedelics were psilocybin (11 million adults), MDMA (4.7 million), Amanita muscaria mushrooms (3.5 million), ketamine (3.3 million) and LSD (3 million).
Beau Kilmer (co-director of RAND Drug Policy Research Center, and coauthor) said: “I am not surprised at all that the psilocybin fungus is on the top list.” “But I wasn’t surprised to see Amanita mucaria so high up on the ranking.”
These new findings are the result of a RAND report published in 2024, which argued that it was “now the time” to make federal policymakers decide on how to regulate the psilocybin as well as other psychedelic drugs.
The report stated that despite federal prohibitions, more than 20 localities had de-prioritized enforcement laws around psychedelics since 2019. “Generally, it has become a low priority or a lowest priority to law enforcement officials.” Oregon has also allowed supervised psilocybin usage, while Colorado’s voters approved not only personal possession but also production of DMT and non-peyote méscaline.
The RAND report states that “now is the time to take action and decide how they would like these models of supply to be structured.” “Or, if they prefer a patchwork of state policies—possibly including those that allow for commercial supply and promotion—they can do nothing and just watch the industry grow.”
If that were to happen, the report says, “it could be very difficult to change the supply of regulations or the power and size of the established industry.”
The new data released this week are based on survey interviews of 10,122 U.S. adults from September 9 through October 1, 2025, with a margin of error of ±1.33 percentage points.
RAND Corporation (funded in large part, by the U.S. federal government) is an independent nonprofit organization that advises policymakers and other public officials on a wide range of topics. In 2021, for example, it released a government-funded report concluding that past cannabis use had relatively little impact on U.S. Army recruits’ overall performance.
Researchers at RAND also contributed to a 2018 report that found that past-month marijuana consumption decreased by a small but statistically significant amount among 8th and 10th grade students in Washington State following legalization there.
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